David Walker

I have had yet another good month experimenting and producing (what I consider, at least!) good PhotoArt. A mixed collection this month, differing techniques with different programs mainly using my own digital photographs.

The Royal Academy of Arts Summer Exhibition has Run without interruption since 1769 – yes, even in 2020 – the Summer Exhibition is the world’s largest open submission art show. It brings together art in all mediums, from prints, paintings, film and photography to sculpture, architectural works and more by leading artists, Royal Academicians and household names as well as new and emerging talent.

I first entered in 2019 and my PhotoArt work “Perhaps the most beautiful resting place in the world?” Was shortlisted for the exhibition, but did not make the final cut.

The brief for 2021 is “celebrating the joy of creating art through the theme of ‘Reclaiming Magic’ and will transcend a singular Western art history’s point of reference to focus on magic and a return to the visceral aspects of art-making. The exhibition will be a celebration of the transformative powers of the magical in art, a return to the ritualistic and the sheer joy of making. Western Renaissance art education, Modernist and Conceptual Art practices led to the devaluing of art practices from other cultures in their unmediated forms. This exhibition seeks to restore value to marginalised practices, to reclaim the magic of those works in the context of the Royal Academy. I seek to propose a new pride in the concept of ‘Primitivism’ as an equally valid form of enlightenment alongside other Art practices”.

My entry is entitled “African Tribesmen” and tries, using PhotoArt techniques, to incorporate the concepts of ‘Primitivism’ as I interpret them. The first cut is to a shortlist of 4,000 on the 1st July 2021 and I hope my work will make that! A tall order as there are usually over 20,000 entries from every conceivable form of art, now including PhotoArt!